


(keep with me forward) all through the night

by LittleMagpie



Category: The Magnus Archives (Podcast)
Genre: 1920s AU, F/M, Fluff and Smut, Gender Affirming Sex, Gender Dysphoria, Gender Feels in general, I'm in love with Barnshawe, Love at First Sight, Oops I forgot the rimming tag, Queer Themes, Reincarnation, Rimming, Romance, THIS IS RIDICULOUSLY SOFT, Trans 4 Trans
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-06
Updated: 2020-09-06
Packaged: 2021-03-07 03:01:09
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,164
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26329816
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LittleMagpie/pseuds/LittleMagpie
Summary: A chance encounter at a queer jazz party in 1920s New York leads to two souls reconnecting, across time and space, to the one with whom they belong.--Part of a larger work in progress, but this bit stands alone; possible future chapters to come.
Relationships: Trans Barnabas Bennett/Trans Jonathan Fanshawe
Comments: 8
Kudos: 20





	(keep with me forward) all through the night

She met him for the first time at a party. 

It was a bright, warm summer night, and live music was pouring out onto the street from the party. The airless, humid heat of mid-July was thick and the queer society folk of New York were mingling both inside and out, a lazy and laughing desultory chatter over champagne. Men in fine linen summer suits were chatting with women in bright knee-length tea dresses, peacocks and peahens sharing the same colors. Plumage waved thinly, sodden in the hot night air, and all manner of humans were crowded into dining rooms and sitting rooms, the electric lights turned up high and the fans tirelessly stirring the air. Mister William Dennison’s friends came in all shapes and sizes and in all manner of presentations, and it was hardly unusual, in these wild and enthusiastic parties, to find a young woman, tall and handsome with the shadow of a beard powdered into submission, being paid court by a cadre of men, some of whom wore stacked heels and hid the curves of their bodies with cleverly tailored suits. 

The moon was full and high over the night-black trees, and in the backyard there was some relief from the vivid, writhing crush of humanity that plagued the house. There was a wide veranda there surrounding a small pool with a fountain at the center, and it was quieter, with the sounds of jazz liquid and bright and distant oozing out into the dim warmth of the night. A tumble of potted plants and low benches gave some illusion of privacy, though in everything it was hard to forget that, even in this accepting place, just how many avid and curious eyes could land upon one no matter where you were at the party.

It was, however, the best place to hide if you were feeling a bit out of your depth. Bonnie had come from inside, and now was fanning herself in the heat with a playbill she’d found in her purse, the little breeze blowing back the honey-brown tendrils of her hair as she sat, light as she could, on the furthest bench. She felt as if she was all elbows and knees, awkward, somehow even more  _ obvious _ than the other women inside with their shadowed jaws, full of wine and laughter. Even her silence felt loud to herself; she had excused herself to the veranda as quickly as she could manage, and had been out for more than half an hour. She still hadn’t cooled down, her ears burning with embarrassment as she rearranged the pleats of her dress.

Bonnie had bought the thing in a giddy whirlwind of enthusiasm when she’d been invited to the party -- though the luminous floral pattern of pinks and yellows and lace had seemed so pretty and feminine at the department store, it and the overblown silk peony pinned to one side of the deep vee of the neckline seemed almost too much now. She shouldn’t, and she knew it, but she weighed herself and found herself wanting in comparison to the more delicate girls that thronged inside in sleek fringed things with their pearls and short-cropped bobs and their painted red rosebud mouths.

The whole thing was a disaster, Bonnie thought dismally, rubbing one hand over a dress-covered knee and feeling the burn of tears behind her eyes. She swallowed hard, not wanting to make a mess of what makeup she’d managed to apply, and lifted her purse to her lap to fish through. Surely she’d brought a handkerchief, she thought as the first hot tear rolled down her cheek, followed by another, and there was no handkerchief to be found. It had been a mistake to come, Bonnie thought morosely -- a mistake to buy the dress, like trying to run before she could even walk -- and that just made the tears come faster, which made her feel even worse. Who cried at a party? A proper woman certainly didn’t, she thought to herself wretchedly, and then, as if the misery of that wasn’t enough, certainly a man didn’t either.

She’d worked herself deep into a spiral of self-loathing and despair by the time the shadow fell over her, and she heard the quiet and tactful clearing of a throat. Her stomach dropped, and she hid her face in her hands. “Go away,” she said wetly, hearing the ungraceful crack of her voice. “Nothing to see here.”

“Of course not,” came the voice, low and guarded. It was a good voice, a little husky, and she parted the gloved fingers of one hand to cautiously peer up through them.

He was not a tall man; Bonnie probably had a couple of inches on him had they both been in bare feet, but sitting down her eyes were level with the prim pink pocket square poking coyly out of the breast pocket of his suit jacket. The knot of his tie, while neatly executed, was at least ten years out of date, and while the coat fitted him all right, the padded shoulders were just a little too wide for the rest of his frame. She swallowed, and then saw after this that he was carefully holding out a handkerchief. “You… you seemed like you needed this,” he said, and he smiled, a narrow and careful thing on his slim brown face. In the moonlight, his smooth-slicked hair was dark, and she could not see his eyes behind the lenses of his glasses.

She gratefully took the offered handkerchief, and tried her best to dry her face without making a hash of the cosmetics she’d spent hours in front of the mirror trying to perfect, but judging from the crooked, rueful smile on the man’s face, Bonnie decided perhaps it was a bit of a lost cause as she saw rouge and kohl smeared on the previously-clean cambric. “I did,” she said, and after all the tears, she felt a bit lighter, as if some of the despair had been lifted from her chest.

“First time at one of these parties?” He asked, smiling sympathetically, tipping his head to one side. A comma of dark hair dislodged from the neatly fashionable way in which he wore it, coming to rest over the narrow, deep line of concentration between the serious brows. “My name’s — “ he hesitated only for a moment, and Bonnie understood suddenly that he was like she was, that the name did not fall from his lips easily yet. “Nathan.” He said it like he was daring someone to prove him wrong, like he would fight the world for this piece of truth, and even in the dark she could feel his steady gaze on her, piercing and clear.

She felt something in her chest go suddenly soft and sweet —  _ oh, Bonnie, you’d better be careful, _ she counseled herself,  _ a man like that could steal a heart before he even knew he was holding it. _ Still, she smiled, absently pleating the borrowed handkerchief in both hands. “My name’s Bonnie,” she whispered -- it was not the first time she had said those words to herself, sitting alone in front of the mirror, with her voice soft, pitchy and strange in her own ears, but it was the first time she’d given it to a stranger. For a moment she held her breath -- it felt fragile, like something that might break in Nathan’s hands if he were too cruel or indelicate with it, but he only smiled, a faint quirk of thin lips.

He held out a hand; automatically, Bonnie put hers into it, and when he bent down to press a gentle kiss to her gloved knuckles, her heart thrilled to it, thrumming like a hummingbird behind bars. This close, with the distance between them halved, she could clearly see his eyes, long-lashed and calm, focused on her. For a moment she felt like perhaps she was the only person in the world cradled in the reflection of his gaze, his long dainty fingers holding hers through a thin layer of cotton, and she drew a shaky breath. “Bonnie. It’s my pleasure to meet you,” Nathan said softly, and she loved the way her name sounded when he said it. It was right, and he was right, too; though she had never met him before, it felt like the dreaming, ineffable motions of the heavens above, as if it had been written an eternity ago when neither of them had ever been more than a thought.

“My… my pleasure entirely,” Bonnie managed, swallowing around the sudden lump in her throat. “I… I appreciate your kindness, sir --”

“Nathan. Please,” he said, and pressing her hand in his, he smiled a crooked little smile that set her heart to running away with itself again. “I was hoping that, if you were feeling better, you might come in and dance with me. It would be… a shame for someone so lovely to sit out here alone all night and not get to enjoy the party.” Nathan sat on the bench next to her, and Bonnie was struck by the spare, prim motions, the almost birdlike way he moved himself, without any wasted movement, each angle and line carefully considered, and something in her chest ached in a way she did not entirely understand. “If you’ll allow me, I can help you get yourself reassembled, and then -- “

“I couldn’t, I’m -- I’m not -- dressed right,” Bonnie said, and her heart was in her throat beating so tight and full that she could hear it in her own voice. “And my, my cosmetics are --”

“You look beautiful,” he chided, and when he said it in that measured tone of utter certainty, she believed it to the bone. “A little smudgy, but beautiful. Here. Let me help.” She surrendered the handkerchief back to him, and leaned in, smiling conciliatorily. This close, she could see the fine lines of stress at the corners of his dark eyes, the stubborn jaw, and that delicate displaced curve of hair between his brows that kindled a sudden and wild urge to brush back into place. He was a lean, trim man, as though God had made him smaller to fit all of his quick, clever precision into one piece of some fine fabric. He leaned to dampen the handkerchief in the fountain, and then his fingers came up under her jaw to hold her in place. Nathan pinched his lips into a prim line, and set about remedying the places her tears had smeared her face. He worked with gentle certainty, and finally, he sat back, letting out a breath she hadn’t been aware he was holding. “There. Do you have a mirror…?”

For a moment she was still mute, her chest too full of voices clamoring about how  _ close _ he had been, a girlish delight at the tingling sensation that remained of his warm dry fingers under her jaw, and Bonnie startled a little when she realized he’d asked her a question. “Oh! Oh,  _ yes _ , I -- “ She bent her head to rummage in her delicate beaded purse for her compact, and to hide the blush that was creeping out all the way to the tips of her ears. It had been the first concession she’d made to femininity, back when she’d simply believed she could hide it behind affability and quietness -- and it was nice, the lacquered surface of it familiar and smooth under her fingers. When she snapped it open and peered inside, Bonnie was for a moment stricken by how soft she looked in the moonlight with her cheeks burning hot with an embarrassed flush and her eyes lambent with the last of her tears, and she felt an unfamiliar euphoria well up in her chest.

“Do I really look like that?” she blurted before she could stop herself, bewildered. Nathan’s laugh was pure warmth, pure sweetness poured into the center of her.

“You do,” he confirmed. “Come on, now, Bonnie girl. Let’s go inside. I want to drink champagne and dance with you, if your dance card isn’t full.”

Buoyed up by his calm and confidence and the tender way he spoke, Bonnie closed the compact and smiled at him as she tucked it back into her purse. Nathan had stood and was offering her his elbow. “I’d like nothing better,” she said, laughing. Bonnie rose, lacing her elbow with his, and letting him lead her back into the close, thriving crush of the party.

Inside, Bonnie knew few people, or at least she did not know them with these faces -- she thought she recognized one woman lustily arguing philosophy with a man that sat too close to her to be proper; she’d fitted a fine linen suit to that woman’s body only just last week, and it had not looked then how it did now draped in a matronly pleated dress and pearls. A young man was perched at a piano in another parlor, playing and singing a ridiculously explicit song in a full-throated, quivering alto, his blond curls peering out from under an overstuffed newsboy’s cap, and being admired by folks in all range and manner of presentation drinking something stronger than champagne. The deeper into the party they went the more Bonnie recognized herself as one of them -- part of this glittering throng of men and women and other, part of something bigger than herself, and the last of her fears were for the moment assuaged.

The champagne, which Nathan gallantly provided each time she requested, made it easier to socialize. By the time she had her third glass in her, the bubbles seemed to have gone to her head, and she was no longer afraid; she would talk to anyone for a moment, a sparkling bit of playful wit or a slightly daffy look of innocence there. Bonnie had taken to the party like a duck to water, as at home in the bright lights and the breathless close press of bodies as she ever was behind the counter at the tailor’s shop.

Though she shared this brightness willingly with others, her hand and eye and voice sought, every few moments, to find Nathan -- and he was there, inches behind, with quiet steady comfort, the quick and easy smile like a gift from heaven, his gentle sure voice there to fill the silences she could not. His deft hands maneuvered her from room to room to meet as many of their peers as she could remember and then some, until names and faces were blurred in Bonnie’s head by sheer numbers and golden bubbles and the feel of Nathan’s warm arm beneath her gloved hand. She was filled to the eyes with community and camaraderie and the simple, incandescent joy of people who took her at who she said she was. Each time someone called her by name it felt more and more right, solidifying her resolution and certainty, and yet it had all been built upon that one moment, on Nathan’s careful voice cradling the syllables and bearing them into the world, giving them weight and substance and  _ reality _ .

Too soon the night began to wear on toward morning, and the numbers of the party began to fall off slowly as people strayed away by ones and twos, stumbling out nightblind and drunk into the world beyond. The band was playing more quietly now, a yearning and warmth to the strings and brass that seemed to have permeated the remainder of the partygoers. There were a few couples still there, but not many; the big fans were still lazily stirring the air on the dance floor, and tucked to one corner of it they swayed, slow and rhythmless and instinctual. 

Nathan was upright still, but Bonnie had wrapped her arms around his shoulders, feeling the shape of them beneath the padded coat and letting his steadiness keep her; her head felt peculiarly soft, as if someone had excised all its sharpest edges and wrapped it in cotton wool. 

“They’re going to kick us out soon,” she said, as if hearing herself from behind and slightly above; her head tipped forward, and she caught an expression of unutterable fondness on the dark, thin features. “I should go… but I don’t want to. I don’t want to leave you.” She was tipsy and beyond, and she knew it. The admission had slipped from her lips as easily as breathing, and Bonnie didn’t regret it.

“You could come with me,” Nathan said, voice low. “We could go together.” His head tipped forward, and his forehead touched hers, a light brush of skin to skin as they slowly swayed together, carried inescapably in the currents of music. “Come home with me, Bonnie girl, I’m not ready to leave you either.” His smile was warm, slow and fathomless, and oh, how was she going to keep from falling in love with him? How could anyone, when his hands stroked up her back, fingers curving against her skin like they belonged there and sending soft giddy frissons of goosebumps up to prickle at the nape of her neck, sweeter than all the champagne bubbles in the world. “I promise I’ll be a perfect gentleman if you wish… just, I can’t bear for the night to be over yet.”

“Neither can I,” Bonnie whispered breathlessly, and she understood all the fairy tale stories of princesses falling in love at first sight, all at once. “I -- okay, Nathan. We’ll go together, only, don’t let go of my hand.”

He didn’t, not when they made their good nights to their happy, inebriated host, and not when, excusing themselves back out into the thick and somnolent night, he hailed a taxi. They rode in silence, holding hands like children in the backseat, afraid to speak or let go lest the spell be broken. Bonnie could feel his gaze on her as they passed with heartbeat frequency under the rhythmic orange glares of streetlamps, and awe welled up deep in the most secret parts of herself; it was so much, so fast, and yet, when it felt so right and good, how could she be afraid? It was like she had always known him -- like the steadiness of him had always stood at her elbow, as sure as she had always known the sun rose in the east and winter followed fall.

They did not speak -- did not  _ need _ to speak -- until the taxi pulled up in front of Nathan’s home. It was a narrow, nondescript house, tucked shoulder to shoulder with many other narrow houses just like it; this late, the street was churchmouse quiet, and the streetlamp burned bright as Nathan scrambled to pay the fare, and then the taxi had gone off ambling into the night.

His hands were trembling as he moved to unlock the door, and she stood behind him, breathless, waiting to be let in as if she were poised on the edge of something delightful. As the door opened, Nathan gestured her inside gently, a hand on the small of her back. “Ladies always first,” he said with a droll little smile, and she was beyond tipsy, but the husky velvet tenor of his voice was everything, and she made a little airless noise as she stepped inside to avoid handling her own feelings. The house was sparsely furnished, as she had somehow known it might be; the touch was a man’s touch, spartan furnishings in fine materials -- the aesthetic spare, from the bare hooks near the door that held the keys and the round unembellished mirror above, to the low wooden bench where his shoes would sit. Bonnie took this in, and saw  _ him _ watching her, and was possessed with the sudden longing to fill it with flowers and music and light. 

He closed the door behind himself, and leaned back against it for a moment, his expression briefly unguarded; in it she could see fear and hope and anxiety tangled tight, his glasses slid low on his nose and his cheeks flushed and his lips a faintly quivering downturned line.

“Are you… all right?” Bonnie asked, voice hesitant and soft. “I hope -- that you don’t regret this -- “

“No! Never,” Nathan said, straightening up, letting out a breath and then laughing, a short and dazed burst as he pushed a hand back through his hair, disordering it just slightly and exposing the natural wave of it. “It’s only that… that you’re the most beautiful woman I’ve ever met, and I cannot believe my luck.” He said it with such sincerity Bonnie felt as if her heart might burst, the flush creeping up to her hairline. “Come with me. I want to show you something.”

Together, hand in hand again, they climbed the narrow stairs to his bedroom. It was not a large room, but it felt more like someone’s home than the sitting room had -- the bed was small, pushed into a corner next to a bedside table that held a lamp, an empty water glass and a small leather case for eyeglasses. There was a large wardrobe on one side of the room, and tucked in beside the closed bathroom door was a small vanity with a round mirror. 

Nathan paused, hesitating, and then smiled, a crooked, wry expression. “I… thought perhaps I could… help you with your cosmetics and your hair. I have experience -- “ He swallowed, and she watched his mouth twist as if he had tasted something bitter, “ -- and I want… I want you to feel as beautiful as you are.” He broke off, looking away with a flush perched high and riotously pink on his dark cheeks, and Bonnie moved impulsively to sit on the low bench in front of the vanity. Her powder had been largely sweated off in the summer heat, her lips were only barely stained red with the lipstick she’d put on, and she had no need of rouge right now, flustered as she was.

“I would be delighted,” Bonnie said playfully, “to be your canvas.” 

Her dress had begun to slide off one shoulder, and she was too drunk to bother pulling it up. Nathan slid out of his jacket, leaving it over the footboard of the bed, and unbuttoned the cuffs of his shirtsleeves to roll each one up to his elbows with practiced, unhurried motions. Bonnie’s gaze settled on those hands, long-fingered, warm, the nails clipped neatly short and well-manicured. She could picture Nathan sitting here at this vanity, caring for those hands, patiently filing the nails, rubbing lotion into palms and fingers -- she could feel, and did before she’d had the chance to stop it, that hand that had slid so gentle and sure under her chin, grasping her jaw in the fragrant still darkness of the garden, and this time in her mind’s eye it was not a damp handkerchief that touched her face but his mouth --

She made a sound, and he blinked down at her, then smiled uncertainly. “If you don’t wish to, I -- “

“No,” Bonnie said quickly, and then again, softer, “no -- this is definitely what I want.” It was not all that she wanted though, and her gaze fell upon his gentle mouth, the way it softened again with comfort as he reached into a basket on the vanity and produced a clean cloth, then disappeared briefly into the bathroom. The sounds of running water emerged from the small room, and while he was gone, Bonnie took a moment to gather herself. She had no doubt this was what she wanted — it was easy, as everything thus far with him had been easy, to make this decision, but what if, when he’d taken off the paint and powder, he thought her a fool, unappealing, unlovable? What if, under all of it, she was a fraud as she had been so afraid she was in the garden? She wanted, more than anyone she had ever met, to be desired by Nathan — to be his Bonnie girl.

He returned, and when he did, he took his seat in front of her, one long leg to either side of the bench, he paused. “You look like you’ve seen a ghost,” Nathan murmured, his brows furrowing as his hands dropped to his lap, holding the wrung-out clean cloth. “Are you… all right?”

She let out a breath, and meant to downplay the anxiety, to brush it off airily without letting it cause them trouble — but the end of that breath had hooks on it like a sob, and caught in her chest. “I’m — I’m just afraid that without the paint you’ll — you won’t like me,” she confessed in a rush, the words tripping over themselves. “You — I know you’re like me, we’re — but you’re so handsome and sure and — I’m just, like this, you see?” For the second time that night, hot tears slid down Bonnie’s cheeks, and she smiled, a trembling little uncertain thing, as she flattened her hands against her chest, where no breasts pushed out the silhouette of the dress.

He let out a breath and then smiled at her with absolute tenderness. “I don’t care about that at all,” Nathan said, and the sureness in his voice could not have been more steadying. “I told you that you were the most beautiful woman I’d ever seen, and I meant it. Paint and powder or not, breasts or not.” He reached up, and again those gentle fingers cradled under her chin, the pads of them rasping just slightly on the faint shadow of slow-growing hair there. Bonnie had never felt more seen, just as she was, met right at the center of her fear and drawn out with such exquisite patience. She held her breath, and he leaned in closer, so certain and so confident —

She could smell the cologne lingering on his skin, the brilliantine in his hair; the warmth of him was like the sun as he leaned in and kissed the tears from one cheek, and then the other. Bonnie’s heart was pounding, her head filled with the closeness of him, and when he pulled back, looking up at her with those serious still eyes, she was smiling again, feeling as if she could bloom like a flower in spring. His gaze flicked across her features, taking her in — doe-wide eyes, tumbled honey-brown waves of hair half-grown-out from her last barbershop visit, her cheeks burning with a fresh flush — and he made a sound that Bonnie felt all the way down in her belly, and leaned in again.

Their lips met then, and Bonnie was giddy with it; Nathan’s slender fingers curled under her chin, and she tilted her head, lips parting in a careful, soft welcome, and the space it left drew his tongue in answer. He kissed like he moved -- gentle, slow and seeking, his tongue against hers, sweeping along the curve of her teeth and lingering shy on the sliver of space between the front two, and after a moment’s hesitation, she let her tongue tangle with his. 

They kissed at first like they had all the time in the world, as if the night was young and they were too, teenagers that could chase their passion down to its inevitable end without regret — and perhaps they were, in a way, new names and a new, fierce sweetness granted by them. She could taste the salt of her own tears on his mouth, and she pressed forward, bolder now that the gap had been breached. Nathan made that sound again like he had before, something in his chest like a gasp, as he leaned into her. His hands moved, the one under her chin curving to cradle her jaw, the other one sliding up her arm, and soon they were clinging to each other, breaths shared as they stoked each other into a slow blaze.

They broke away after a moment, and Nathan was looking at her as if she was something new in the world, stunned with the sight of her. Bonnie was not entirely sure she looked any more together than he did. Both of them were breathing in soft gasps, and Bonnie lifted one hand to touch her mouth, where her lips felt tingling-hot and swollen from the kissing. “Oh,” she said, wondering. “Oh.” 

It was not as if she had never kissed before, but all those kisses felt like they had been in another life, another world, compared to this vivid acuteness -- like she had been wearing a mask, and perhaps she had. “I -- I don’t know what to say, I -- “

“You don’t have to say anything,” Nathan said, a breath after her voice faltered. “Only what you want to.” His eyes searched her face, unbearably soft, unfathomably kind, and she felt again as if she had known him forever, his kind eyes and gentle hands and the stillness of him, as implacable and inevitable as destiny. For a moment she felt a brief sense of dizzy certainty that she had known that feeling before somehow, and just as soon as it had come it was gone, swept away by wine and kisses. “But I want to kiss you again. If you want that too, pretty Bonnie, then — “ He levered himself up onto one knee on the bench, the fabric of her skirt crinkling softly beneath him, and one gentle hand tucked one of Bonnie’s curls behind one ear. “Please, let me know…?”

She laughed, an airy and giddy sound, and did not wait for him to kiss her this time; her arms slid around his waist and drew him in close, his body warm against hers and her mouth on his, and they did not break the kiss until both of them were lightheaded with the joy of it. His hands were in her hair, rumpling the artless waves, and hers were at his hips, her clever tailor’s fingers nearly spanning the width of him to meet in the middle, and that felt right, too. 

The exploration did not come all at once — his hands dropping to the breadth of her shoulders, smoothing palms along them with near-religious reverence; hers sliding up to the hidden narrowness of his waist, fingers dipping under and bunching the hem of his smart vest — but it was easy to get carried away by voice and touch and taste. Before she knew it, he was kissing his way up to her ear along her jaw, lips brushing skin, into the intimate and perfumed hollow behind it; she was all goosebumps, fingers on the buttons of his vest fumbling with them to seek the humid softness of his dress shirt beneath. He was whispering against that tender place, “Even if it’s only for tonight, let me love you, my Bonnie girl,” in a voice he was no longer taking pains to deepen, and she could not have wanted him more.

“Yes,” Bonnie whispered, her voice escaping in a rush of air that stirred his hair as it went, “oh, please, yes —“ His palm rested open on her thigh, she could feel the warmth of it through her dress and her stockings, and she let out a little noise. “Are you — sure you want to, ah, to see me?” There was still doubt, but he laughed softly, and as he pulled back, she saw the confident, focused heat in his eyes, and her fear eased.

“I do,” he said simply, and for a moment Bonnie was overcome with a nameless tangle of emotion. She pulled back, then, and turned to offer him her back. He did not need to be told what to do — his fingers found the zipper, and he gently pulled it down with a low and buzzing whisper. As it went it bared her back to him; cloth fell away to reveal fine smooth skin, and Bonnie gasped with surprise as he ran one fingertip down her spine to where the dainty lace of her slip started. She knew what she looked like from behind from long objective observation in mirrors, but there was something different altogether about it when she felt the heat of his gaze sliding over her skin. She felt…  _ observed _ , a sensation at once arousing and unnerving.

“I never thought I’d get to wear this slip,” Bonnie whispered confidingly to break the breathless silence, sliding her arms out of the dress and letting it crumple down around her hips. She laughed softly as she ran her hands up and down her arms to dispel the prickling of goosebumps. “I made it months ago…” 

Her attention was quickly shifted somewhere lower and more intimate when she felt his mouth pressing damp kisses against her spine, prim at first and then less so. His lips parted and she could not swallow her moan when she felt his tongue and teeth rasp at the nape of her neck. It was a breathless, throaty sound of startled pleasure -- Nathan’s answering hum was pure delight, vibrating against her skin as his mouth worked there, tasting the perspiration of the evening and leaving behind a round, rosy mark right below the bottom edge of her hair, where the dark cropped curls stood no chance at hiding it. “Oh,” she gasped, and he laughed, low and warm with satisfaction. “Oh!”

His hands were moving again, curving up her sides, caressing over skin covered in satin, and she could feel his breaths coming quicker against her shoulders as she tried not to squirm, his palms skimming up over her belly as his chest pressed against her back. “We should go to the bed,” Nathan said breathlessly, and there was a funny hitch in his voice, but he slid his palms up over her chest, and cupped what little softness she had there -- his thumbs were clever, feathering over her nipples and making her give a tiny, urgent little whine. When she looked down, his hands cupping her sent a pulsing, sweet ache down to dwell between her legs, and she trembled somewhere down in the most secret places of her soul.

“Yes,” she said, and she could hear pleading in her voice -- Bonnie could not have said what she was pleading for, only that she  _ wanted _ with a powerful need, as if a great void of yearning had opened up in her chest and the only thing that could fill it was Nathan’s touch, his clever mouth on her skin, the restrained curve of his body against hers. He teased, fingers tightening to pinch and roll her nipples through skin-heated slippery fabric, and her spine arched as if she could lift her breasts more firmly into his hands. Her voice broke softly on a husky sound, and when his fingertips relented into the kneading cup of palms sliding, her nipples were taut little buds against them. 

“Please,” Bonnie whispered, “please!” She had been to bed with men before, but there was something unbearably sensual about it now; their fumbling and clumsy hands on her body had been nothing compared to this, the way she could tuck back against him and feel like some small and luscious creature, wanton and yielding beneath his clever hands.

He finally let her go, and she almost whimpered at the loss of him, only just swallowing it down before it came out. Nathan stood with the sound of crinkling fabric as she tried to compose herself; he came around to the front of her, and when he did, Bonnie could see he had discarded his vest, and stood before her in pants and shirtsleeves. His shoes had been kicked under the vanity, and he was perhaps two inches shorter than she was in flat feet, but the loss of height made him seem somehow more vulnerable in his stocking feet. Without the compression of the vest, she could now see more clearly the curve of his body swaddled with fabric beneath the soft white cloth of his shirt, softness half-crushed, and he tipped up his chin, half-hiding his expression behind the gleam of his smart little spectacles. 

She felt only fascination with him, acceptance and desire; whatever the shape of him, it did not matter, only that he was hers and she was his, even if only for one stolen night -- even if the thought of never feeling those serious dark eyes on her again, or hearing her voice spoken with such care, made her want to weep. 

He held out his hands to her, and she offered hers to him; he took first one hand in both of his, cradling it, and turning it palm up as he gently freed one finger at a time, pinching the cotton and pulling it away from her fingers, until he could gently strip away the glove. Before moving on to the second, he bent his handsome dark head, cradling the back of her hand in his, and pressed a chaste kiss into her palm. Each of her fingertips followed, as he paid particular attention to the places needlework had roughened them with calluses, and that in itself was enough to lift that sudden unbidden ache that had come to her chest. His mouth felt electric against the bare skin of her hands, and her fingers were trembling by the time he moved to the second hand and gave it the same intimate, careful treatment. 

She didn’t even have time to protest when he went down onto his knees before her, and gently patted one knee. “A foot, if you please,” Nathan murmured expectantly, and she turned a rather becoming shade of pink, covering her face with one hand as she lifted a foot and placed it on the offered knee.

Her shoes had been secondhand, bought in the same hurry she had bought the dress in, and were a shade too tight; when Nathan gently undid the strap, it had bitten a line across the arch of her foot through her stockings, and he made a sound of dissatisfaction as he gently maneuvered the cruel thing off her foot. His palms gently chafed the sting out of the abused flesh of her heel through silky nylon, thumbs smoothing over that angry, ruddy line, and then he put her foot down, not needing to prompt her for the second. Bonnie did not know if she had ever felt so cherished in her life, helpless in the face of such studious and tender care, with that proud head bowed before her and those fingers sliding up ankle and calf, exploring the lines of her as if he had never seen such a thing before. Perhaps Nathan was as spellbound as she was, mutely admiring.

When he grasped both her hands, she stood without having to be told, and the department-store dress fell down onto the floor in a floral-fabric puddle around her feet, leaving her thoroughly in  _ deshabille _ . He looked up at her from this angle, and she felt the heat of that so-controlled gaze through the satin of her chemise, her breaths feeling a little short. The fashion called for straight lines, for boy-slim hips and a handsome posture, and she had no need of corseting for that; only soft fabric to smooth the slide of the dress against her skin, and beneath it, matching nylon panties and, indulgence of indulgences, garters. With her long legs, the nylon of her stockings was stretched taut at the clip, and it showed at the hem of her slip, fabric strained translucent into a tight upside-down V. She could feel herself aroused and flushed, aching and hot against the confines of her panties.Her toes curled slightly — with him knelt before her, with those patient eyes burning softly up at her, Bonnie felt fair worshiped.

His hands slid, sure and confident, up her stockinged legs, skimming skin-warmed nylon and then gently flicking the clips open. The tension on her stockings eased, and she shivered at the feel of it against her skin, the breathless slide of fabric against fresh-shaven smoothness. “ — only as much as you are comfortable with,” Nathan was saying, but that brief moment of unbearable eroticism had distracted her, and Bonnie refocused on him like she’d been caught in the act of some sweet sin, biting her lip.

“All of me,” Bonnie felt the words tumbling from her lips on automatic in a shivering profusion, “all of me—“ then her hands were gently pleating up the fabric of her slip, and his were at the waistband of her panties, drawing them down with that same care with which he had treated all of her thus far. “Please, Nathan -- please!” She didn’t know what she was asking for -- perhaps it was for him not to change his mind once he saw her arousal, or perhaps she was asking him for more than simple physical pleasure. It was all right because when that serious gaze settled on her, Nathan was smiling; she could not miss the tender and hazy heat in those bottomless eyes.

“Please what, my beauty?” His voice had gone soft and rich, heavy with promise; Bonnie’s hands were trembling where they held up the crumpled satin of her slip. “I want this to be good for you, so tell me what you want, so I can give it to you.”

“The bed,” she gasped, turning her gaze briefly to it, and then back to him, “and you, touching me, please -- whatever you want to touch -- “ She was so afraid he would find the difference between her body and her heart irreconcilable, so terrified that he would pull away from her and leave her cold and trembling and needy -- “Do you mind this -- do you mind me?” Her voice was quivering with anxiety and restraint, as she whispered, “please tell me I don’t repulse you --”

Jonathan’s brows rose and his mouth shaped an O of astonishment. “I -- Bonnie girl, I knew who you were when I brought you here,” he said. “I would be the worst kind of man if I had lied to you to bring you this far and then left you alone.” 

He tipped his head, and leaned in to press his mouth, open and wet, to the underside of Bonnie’s arousal, pressing lips and tongue in a lush kiss to that heated flesh. She nearly keened with the sudden heat of his mouth, her knees half-buckling in sudden response. Her hands released the froth of satin and lace that was her slip in favor of his hair, pushing into the otter-dark wealth of it and rumpling it thoroughly as he kissed every inch of her. His eyes closed and his expression brightened with near-religious exaltation as the fabric bunched softly up behind the taut ache that was the unmistakable evidence of her wanting.

“To the bed,” he suggested, and Bonnie did not need to be told a fourth time — she turned away, stumbling in her eagerness and climbing up into the narrow thing as the mattress springs protested squeakily. It did not escape her notice that Nathan was still dressed, however, and she half sat up onto her elbows as he followed her. He hesitated a moment, and in deference to his own comfort he slipped a few shirt-buttons loose. At the open neck of his shirt, Bonnie caught again the glimpse of wrapped fabric, pulled carefully and smoothly taut across his chest. She understood quite clearly why he was not baring himself to her; she flushed softly at the loss of chance to touch his skin, but she was already too involved and needy to risk upsetting him with something that did not matter unless it mattered to him. 

That done, he crawled up between her legs and she gasped as she felt his hands slide up along her inner thighs. Her head was on his pillow, surrounded with the warm clean scent of him; her body was primed and ready, and when Nathan’s mouth found her at the center of where she needed it most, Bonnie found the thoughts scattering from her mind like dizzy birds, escaping her grasp faster than she could lay hands on them.

He had a clever mouth, and a shamelessly clinical knowledge of where to best apply it; his tongue was hot and wet and slid along her lavishly, focusing sweetly at the most sensitive places, like the tender ridge below the head of her, tracing the shapes with the pointed tip of his tongue as Bonnie fought not to cry out, biting her lip and writhing. His hands curved around to cup the flushed, sticky heat of her arousal as he lapped at her, and his ragged hushed noises drifted up from between her thighs with the soft and slick sounds of tongue on trembling flesh. This, combined with his short and staggered breaths, seemed to go straight to her head, a potent cocktail of lust and desire more intense than anything she’d ever felt.

He seemed to know what she craved -- his mouth, everywhere, tongue and lips and occasionally the finest brush of teeth -- and everything she didn’t want in turn; he drew only the tip of her into his mouth, and did not ask for more of her length when she flinched the first time he tried. Bonnie did not thrust up into that mouth either, though her thighs and hips hitched and shuddered helplessly as he drove her pleasure up to the edge, and held her there without letting her tip over with exquisite care, once, twice,  _ three times _ , only to bring her softly down to herself with lavish kisses and hoarse, breathy words. “Beautiful Bonnie,” he said with unfathomable warmth against the silky nest of curls where her rosy length met her body, nose nuzzled into her, “Lovely girl -- “

“Nathan,” she cried, and her hands tangled in the dark, silky wealth of his hair again, filling palms and fingers with the warm and living texture of it. She felt his startlement beneath her hands -- felt what was almost a growl of delight as his hands slid off her arousal, and then moved down to cup the trembling firmness of her ass, lifting her just slightly from the bed. Bonnie gasped, questioning, before she felt firm thumbs pressing into the curves of her cheeks, spreading them open and exposing her opening to him. Her cheeks flooded with helpless heat under this intimate scrutiny, and she wanted to cover her mouth with one hand but was greedily unwilling to let go of her handfuls. “Nathan, I -- “

She did not get the words out before his mouth covered her there too, his hands bruising-tight holding her open for him while his mouth worked against that sensitive pucker. He lapped at first, short broad strokes with the flat of his tongue, and oh, Bonnie wasn’t going to last long under this exquisite assault. She had always been vocal, but her head turned to one side as she bit her lip to try — and fail — to contain the squeals and gasps of pleasure that filled her throat. Her legs trembled and one stocking foot was sliding against the sheets as she tried to lift herself into his mouth. Bonnie’s gaze turned down to him; she found the sight of her flushed body gleaming in the moonlight nearly unbearable in its wonder, her chest and belly heaving with gasps and her arousal straining untouched, a strand of her slick catching silver light between the tip of her and her own belly, where it pooled in the dip of her navel. “Please,” she begged, abstracted and senseless with feeling, fingers tightening in his hair enough to draw a sliver of a gasp from his throat, “please! Nathan! I -- I’ll -- “

“Do it,” Nathan said, and his voice was thick and hoarse from between her legs as his tongue curled into that hidden crevice again to press her open. Bonnie’s mind filled suddenly with the thought of the exquisite care with which he would prepare her, the sensation of being slicked by fingers and pried open to be filled with his cock. Her eyes squeezed shut, tears of pleasure spiking her lashes as she cried out senselessly and came harder than she ever had in her life, messily coating her belly with her spending as her body twisted in his hands. Nathan could not hold her still -- she rather thought God himself could not have held her still as euphoria flooded the space between her hips and poured out of her in a release prolonged by his mouth on her still moving.

When she began to come down, she blinked tear-sticky eyes down at him, and saw Nathan still knelt between her legs, half-upright now. One arm was pressed into the space between his own still-clothed thighs, and he was rocking against the heel of his own fisted hand once -- twice -- and on the third time he gave a short, sharp, bitten-off little sound like glass or composure breaking as the thin dark face was briefly transfigured into something soft and flushed and divine with pleasure and relief, haloed with moon-gilded dark waves of hair that no longer had any pretense at control. Nathan’s gaze behind tip-tilted, smeared glasses was hot and unfocused when he looked back up at her, and he smiled a warm, crooked, sideways smile that made Bonnie’s heart melt. “Was --” his voice was husky and he had to clear it, licking his lips with a tongue awkward and clumsy with overuse, “was that good for you…?” 

For a moment he looked more vulnerable than he had for the whole of the evening, and Bonnie couldn’t help a giddy laugh.

“It was wonderful,” she sighed, and she held out her hand to him, catching his and tangling their fingers together in adoration. He was still breathing heavily, looking just a touch out of sorts now, as if he’d exposed just a little too much of himself. “You’re… I’ve never had that done for me.” Her cheeks still glowed a mellow pink, and she wore an almost beatific look of utter satiety.

“I suspected perhaps that was the case,” Nathan allowed, chuckling softly. His thumb was sweeping a slow arc along the side of hers, and Bonnie was put in mind of the smug, contented tail-twitch of a happy, dozing cat. “Let me get a cloth to — oh.” He made a face, pinching his lips together in bemusement. “I never did use the one I got to clean your face.”

She giggled, dozy and tipsy now that the tension had been purged, and gestured with one boneless hand. “Well, one’s good for both, then,” Bonnie said. She felt as if someone had relaxed all the strings that held her joints together, as if her bones were only loosely associated with one another, and then she amended a moment later, “Perhaps my face first, though,” drawing a startlingly sweet laugh of genuine amusement out of Nathan as he climbed over her to fetch and refresh the towel.

“I’ll be right back,” Nathan said, and he disappeared into the bathroom for a moment. Bonnie laid relaxed out on the bed, too euphoric to worry too much about the mess drying on her belly, and drifted comfortably while she listened to the pleasantly domestic sounds of water running, rustling clothes, and footsteps returning. He wore pajamas now, striped fabric that had clearly been poorly fitted to half-conceal his body. He had clearly washed his face and brushed his teeth, prim as if he hadn’t just had his mouth all over every inch of Bonnie. His hair was combed neatly and he was carrying the cloth again, now newly wet. 

Bonnie didn’t move, splayed comfortably out on the bed with her wrist draped with boneless dramatics over her forehead, her breaths already beginning to smooth softly towards sleep when he moved to sit beside her. She made a drowsy sound, and turned that sleepy, daffy grin on him. 

“Sorry,” Nathan said, “I didn’t mean to wake you.” His voice was hushed, and Bonnie wondered if she was imagining the sweetness in it, the singsong lilt she’d never thought would be turned on her, the half-whispered tenderness she imagined the world reserved for beloved wives and precious children. “Just give me one moment, I’ll clean you up and let you sleep.” A soft half-smile curved his lips as he raised his cloth. “In the morning I’ll help you get reassembled and safely home.” 

She tilted her head toward him, lolling softly against the pillow and her own hair, and he gently began to wipe her face clean. The cloth was soft and warm, and he was meticulous about it, stroking the wet fabric along her skin until the last remnants of tears and makeup came off onto it, leaving only the flush of her cheeks, the tender natural pink of her mouth, and the natural dark fan of her lashes casting starlit shadows across her cheeks in the dark. The night was wearing thin, darkness beginning to edge toward a deep and somber predawn grey. He must have been sleepy too, but Bonnie let him pamper her, washing off the traces that remained of their activities from her belly, tugging her slip softly down to give her modesty, and then smoothing the counterpane up over her, where it seemed to bear her deliciously weary body down as if it weighed more than the world, drawing her down deeper into the comfort of the narrow mattress.

She felt his weight shift at the edge of the bed, heard the soft creak as he moved to stand, and one of her arms reached out blindly to catch his wrist. “Wait,” Bonnie whispered, drowsier than she would have liked to admit. “Stay with me, Nathan?” Her eyes squinted open, and she could only see him in silhouette, but she felt as if she could feel his smile without seeing it at all.

He leaned in close to press a soft and tender kiss above each brow, paused for a breath, then kissed right at the tip of her nose, so light she could have almost believed she imagined it. “Of course, my Bonnie girl,” came the voice as she was drawn irresistibly toward dreaming. “I’ll be right here when you wake.”

When she had fallen asleep with an open, unguarded, dreaming smile on her face, Nathan remained awake for a long few moments. He let out a deep breath he hadn’t been aware he was holding, and set his hands to his knees to lever his weary body onto its feet. Without thinking about it, he pulled the shutters, set an alarm on the clock across the room, and slipped into the sliver of bed remaining beside her. He laid awake for several more minutes with his head half on Bonnie’s shoulder and his knee fitted over the curve of her thigh and tried not to think too much about what the future might bring -- trying not to hope for too much, and failing.


End file.
